


Over the Edge

by Trobadora



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: M/M, Mind Palace Moriarty, Post-The Final Problem, Sherlock's Mind Palace
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-13
Updated: 2019-06-13
Packaged: 2020-04-05 17:01:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19044634
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Trobadora/pseuds/Trobadora
Summary: "Can't keep locking me away, Sherlock," Moriarty says, too brightly. "Not that I didn't have a grand old time, down here with Redbeard and Eurus and all the things you wouldn't remember. But the doggie's out of the well now."Sherlock, in the aftermath: With his childhood memories restored, there's only one thing left, hidden away. One thing Sherlock hasn't faced.





	Over the Edge

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Belle82DevArt](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Belle82DevArt/gifts).



  


* * *

  


"You always feel it, Sherlock, but you don't have to fear it."  
\--Jim Moriarty

  


* * *

  


"Did you miss me?" asks Moriarty's image on every screen in the country.

" _Do_ you miss him?" asks Mycroft, in Sherlock's mind palace.

"Miss me?" asks Mary's message, using Moriarty's words to snag Sherlock's attention.

Sherlock doesn't listen. What does it matter? Moriarty is dead, after all.

  


* * *

  


"Did you miss me?" That question again, in that same familiar lilt, from somewhere behind Sherlock. The telly, of course.

"No." Quick, immediate, bored. Without turning. Sherlock's done this too many times before.

"Liar." Just as quick.

That, too, is familiar: Sherlock knows better than to let the retort affect him. Still, he turns his head after all, and there it is - Moriarty's face on the telly, red-tinged. (Red, not sepia: overlaid with another memory.) He's making kissy faces now, lips pursed in exaggerated invitation.

As always, Sherlock's contempt for the childish ridiculousness is lost in admiration of the sheer deliberate intent that pushes straight through _embarrassing_ and into _creepy_ , into _dangerous_.

Nonetheless, "Why should I miss you?" he snaps, snatches up the remote and hits the power button.

With a sound between a hiss and a click, the telly turns off. Reality turns off with it, and flickers back on a moment later to a different version of the same flat, stark electric light replaced by gaslight, an actual fire crackling in the fireplace.

Moriarty looks up at Sherlock from his knees, dressed in Victorian garb, holding a pistol to his lips.

Sherlock stumbles a step back. "I'm not high," he protests. "I don't do that any more." His mind palace doesn't _do_ things like this, not without an external trigger, not without reason. It's his own mind, after all.

"Aren't you?" Moriarty's tongue snakes out, slides along the barrel; then he puts the pistol down, lips stretching into a rather disconcerting smile. Something prickles at the back of Sherlock's neck, and he reaches into the pocket of his dressing gown, but it's empty. His own gun isn't there.

Moriarty turns around on his knees, away from Sherlock. The back of his head is a gaping wound. He looks over his shoulder. "Come on, don't be squeamish now. You've always wanted to fuck my brain."

Sherlock flinches, swallows. "Can't fuck it if it isn't there," he retorts - the crude words are easy to match if he doesn't think too closely about Moriarty's meaning - even as he backs slowly away towards the door. A quick turn, throw it open -

It's the Bride standing before him, and he freezes, his heart racing along with his mind as he tries to work out why he's here, why she is. What his mind palace is trying to tell him.

Emelia Ricoletti's veil lifts: Moriarty again, his lips smeared with red paint. "Give us a kiss."

From somewhere behind Sherlock, it's not Moriarty, but Mycroft's cool, half-disdainful voice that says, "You may now kiss the bride."

  


* * *

  


Sherlock startles awake for the third time this week, his breathing heavy, his heart pounding in his chest and in his ears.

He hasn't been using. Hasn't so much as smoked a cigarette. Isn't currently in danger, either - the opposite, actually. Things have been rather unexciting lately, all the cases coming his way almost too dull to bother solving.

Not that he's been bored yet, not quite. There's Rosie, keeping them all on their toes as only a baby can. There's John, still struggling with the aftermath of Mary's death and his own breakdown, not to mention Eurus's mind games. There's Eurus herself, now, connecting with her family across the vast distance between her mind and everyone else's, even Sherlock's own. And there's Mycroft, who isn't handling the aftermath of Sherrinford too well.

But there's nothing immediate, nothing urgent. In short, there's no reason why Moriarty should be forcing himself onto Sherlock's mind.

"Did you miss me?" he keeps asking, as if the answer should change.

Sherlock snorts in disdain. He does miss the cases, of course. He misses the challenge posed by a mind that can match his own. Obvious.

Just as obvious: he doesn't miss Moriarty. The man was suicidal, homicidal, insane. What's there to miss? He doesn't.

Of course he doesn't.

  


* * *

  


When Sherlock dies, he tumbles into a padded cell, a hidden corner at the back of his mind where unanswered questions live. Where danger lives.

Moriarty whispers _pain, heartbreak, loss, death_ in his ears, whispers danger to John. Sings of grief and provokes him into living.

Sherlock lives again, and Moriarty is there - on the telly, in his mind, in Eurus's game. But not in his nightmares, not until now.

Not in his mind palace, unbidden, without impending disaster to provoke his appearance, that sure and unmistakeable harbinger of danger, adrenaline, death.

Now, today, Sherlock's mind palace takes the form of a CCTV control room: he's trying to reconstruct how the thief he's tracking managed to avoid all the cameras. Monitors all around - and the leftmost, bottom row, at the edge of his vision, has just gone sepia. That clip again.

Sherlock resolutely ignores it. There's nothing it has to tell him. Nothing at all.

  


* * *

  


Sherlock draws in a sharp breath, sits up straighter on reflex: Moriarty's face hovers over him, too close, head tilted to the side, dark eyes narrowed and lips pursed. A moment later, Moriarty performs a grimace of extreme disgust, straightens, and braces his foot against Sherlock's chair, right between his thighs. Then, almost lazily, he pushes. In slow motion, Sherlock's chair tips backwards, and falls.

Sherlock falls. Is falling.

Falling again, and not landing on the floor. Not the same floor his chair had stood on. Not 221b: a padded cell. This again. Back to square one.

Sherlock makes to throw up his hands, an expansive gesture of frustration, and can't - his arms are wrapped around his body, secured in a straitjacket. He turns his head around instead, dread rising under his skin. 

There's no one else here, only the bare, padded walls around him, and a chain keeping him from the door. There's only him, trapped here in Moriarty's place.

  


* * *

  


Sherlock bolts upright in his bed, breathing ragged, struggling to free his hands from the duvet.

Grasping for control.

  


* * *

  


Sherlock paces the length of the flat, from living room windows through the kitchen, past the bathroom and into his bedroom, then back. He makes himself a mug of tea. Takes a sip, scowls. His skin is itching. None of this makes sense. Why is this happening? Why can't he make sense of it? What's happening to his mind?

_Gone round the bend, over the edge, off the deep end._

He flings the mug at the wall. Tea and fragments splatter everywhere.

  


* * *

  


"Are you sleeping?" Mrs Hudson asks, dubiously. "There's not a case, is there? I heard something crashing again last night."

"You're not taking anything, are you?" Molly asks, her eyes narrowed, her brow furrowing with irritation and concern.

"You're sure we're good?" John asks, as if it were his fault that Sherlock's been out of sorts.

Mycroft says nothing, his mouth twisting, but for once, Sherlock wishes he would. Some insight might be useful, even from his too-supercilious brother.

  


* * *

  


Sherlock looks up from the experiment he just spoiled by distractedly pouring tea into his test tube, looks across from the kitchen table to the living room - and startles at the figure sitting in his own armchair.

Moriarty isn't paying attention to Sherlock, instead studying an apple. Very ripe, lovely red blush. (The apple, of course, a juicy Idared. Moriarty doesn't blush. He could, no doubt, and it'd be a gorgeous act, but that's not what Sherlock is looking for right now. His mind palace is cooperating at least that far.) Then he finally looks up, eyes dark and inscrutable, his face a mask Sherlock can't penetrate. "I called you the virgin for a reason, you know."

Sherlock scowls. "Because it pissed me off." And what's that got to do with anything?

"Well, yes, of course," Moriarty says, and his smile seems almost indulgent. "Would hardly have been worth it, otherwise. But not _just_ that, Sherlock, do keep up."

"Not because you thought I am. You knew too much about me to have missed my reputation during that phase."

Sex was a tedious thing, predictable and dull, but he'd had to experiment to make certain of it, after all.

"Missed?" Moriarty's grin widens. "I thought about introducing myself to you then. But you'd have been boring."

Sherlock can't even deny it. Frustration burns in his veins. None of this is making any sense.

  


* * *

  


The Beretta's muzzle trails slowly down the side of Sherlock's face, and Sherlock struggles not to slide back further in his chair, away. Not because he's afraid: because he doesn't understand.

"Such lovely symmetry," Moriarty murmurs, standing over him, and in a way, it is. This, after all, is the weapon Moriarty used to kill himself. "Come on now, Sherlock. Don't be boring. Solve the puzzle."

"You're not real. You can't threaten me."

"That's not how it works. You know that." Moriarty draws the gun across Sherlock's upper lip, then shrugs and carelessly tosses it over his shoulder. His hands cup Sherlock's face between them, and he leans forward, very close. Sherlock can feel his breath as he speaks. "The gun's just a symbol. But we don't need those right now, do we?"

Sherlock shivers, and says nothing.

"Don't bore me. You know what happens when I get bored."

 _Adrenaline. A thrill like none other. People ending up dead._ But why this? And why now? It should all be long in the past. None of it's coming back. Moriarty is dead, after all.

Yet Sherlock keeps coming back to this. 

With a drawn-out, weary sigh, Moriarty pulls away from him. "You don't have to fear it, Sherlock."

That again. Fear what?

Moriarty raises his face to the ceiling, walks over to the door, taps his fingernails against the frame. Studies the wallpaper, then runs his fingers along an edge, starts peeling it away with his fingernails.

"Leave the wallpaper alone," Sherlock snaps.

"That's not what I do, Sherlock. That was never what I did."

Moriarty peels off the edge of the wallpaper with a fingernail, then pulls. It comes off - the whole sheet, the whole wall, the whole flat, ceiling and all, revealing a round padded cell.

When Moriarty turns back around, he's in the straitjacket. Small blessings.

"This is how you like me, isn't it?" Moriarty says, and Sherlock twitches, caught. "Controlled. Restrained. This is where you keep me." Turning to sing-song: "But that's over now, my dear."

Yes, but why? Why is it over?

"Can't keep locking me away, Sherlock," Moriarty continues, too brightly. "Not that I didn't have a grand old time, down here with Redbeard and Eurus and all the things you wouldn't remember. But the doggie's out of the well now."

Sing-song again at the end, every word emphasized.

Sherlock blinks. It repeats, rings in his head like a Greek chorus: Redbeard. The well. His memories. 

_Oh._

  


* * *

  


Lying awake that night, Sherlock thinks of Victor Trevor, of children playing pirates, of Eurus and her song.

That's why, then: with Sherlock's childhood memories restored, there's only one thing left, hidden away. One thing Sherlock hasn't faced.

One man.

What is it that he still can't see? What is it he's buried, down in that cell, in that straitjacket, at the bottom of the back of his mind?

 _Could ask Eurus._ She probably knows. But does she understand? Unlikely, very unlikely, and it's understanding he needs, not mere knowledge.

And this won't go away away until he faces it. _He_ won't go away until Sherlock faces him.

A scowl. Resignation. Needs must, then: when there's no other answer, go straight to the source.

  


* * *

  


In his mind palace, Sherlock is pacing, up and down the living room, up and down. He still hasn't found the clue to the puzzle. None of this makes sense.

 _Doesn't it?_ It's not Moriarty's voice, there at the back of Sherlock's head, but it sounds just like him.

Sherlock keeps pacing, round and round and round. And round, until the walls have turned into something padded, and he stops, looking down at a crouching figure in a straitjacket. "All right, let's have it."

Moriarty lifts his head, eyes wide and wild, looking unkempt and dangerous, but the real danger is, as always, in just how much he's not what he seems. "You need me, or you're nothing."

"No." Sherlock throws up his hands, turns away. "No, no, no, no, no. We're long past that. Give me something meaningful, or go away."

"You need me," Moriarty repeats, eyes wide, earnest as only a liar can be. "Why else are you here?"

Sherlock glares at him. Tries a minor concession. "Of course I miss you. You were never boring; crime was never boring when you were around. Who wouldn't miss that? But I certainly don't need you."

"But you _are_ here." Moriarty grins, straightens - his chains clink - and then snaps forward, right into Sherlock's face, with a snarl. Sherlock pulls back. It's not a flinch, not quite. Moriarty's next words are quiet - a mocking, altogether too accurate imitation of Mycroft's voice: "What may we deduce from that?"

Sherlock scowls. He _is_ here, that's the problem. Well, not _the_ problem, but _a_ problem. He shouldn't be, really. But he needs answers, and this is where the answers are.

"Deduce away, then." Condescending. When in doubt, condescend.

Moriarty, of course, does condescending just as well as he. "Special performance just for you. You pay the price, my dear. But then you know that." He rolls his head, his shoulders, his whole body undulating, then lifts one shoulder. "Need me?" He lifts the other. "Want me? Take your pick. Or you can also do both, you know. No other options." Both shoulders now, drawn up to his ears, with a smirk that's too knowing. Moriarty knows something he doesn't. Which, here, in his mind palace, means _he_ knows something he hasn't realised. Hasn't faced.

But then, that's why he's here, isn't it?

And Moriarty is right: Sherlock came here for a reason. It's something he needs, or something he wants, or both. It can't be neither, or he wouldn't have come. His skin breaks out in gooseflesh, and he resists the urge to rub his forearms.

"Which is it, Sherlock? I said," harshly, "take - your - pick."

He _doesn't_ need Moriarty; that much he's sure of. But the other is inconceivable. The vein at his temple begins to throb.

Sherlock stalls for another moment. Then, rapid-fire: "I don't want you," last denial. - "Yes, you do," cold assurance. - "All right; I do. Now what?" Surrender.

His mind palace doesn't collapse at the words. It's only Sherlock's throat that's tight, only his mouth that's dry, only his body that feels tense and tightly wound, close to the breaking point. 

"Congratulations!" Moriarty's mouth spreads into a wide, false grin. "You've mastered the art of being honest with yourself. Well, me, but that's the same thing, isn't it?"

"Unfortunately." That's another problem. Still not _the_ problem, though.

An eyeroll, one that doesn't belong in this room. One whose weariness belongs on a rooftop, minutes before a death. "Stop being afraid of it." And Moriarty hums _Don't Fear the Reaper_ , with no joy at all.

"You always tell me that."

"Because it's true. Pain, death, heartbreak. And other things." A grin, with eyes wide. Manic, but deliberately so. With Moriarty, how else? "Same thing, isn't it? We both know -"

"You don't know anything."

"Of course I don't," Moriarty says agreeably. "I'm dead. What's your excuse?" He snorts. "It's all right to admit you're afraid."

"I'm not afraid of you!"

"Oh, not of me. Not even of what I'll do."

"It's my mind palace." Moriarty can't do anything. Moriarty isn't even real. Which means ...

"Exactly! That's the problem, Sherlock, and you know it." Moriarty's only voicing the thought at the forefront of Sherlock's mind: it's not what _Moriarty_ will do that he's worried about. "You came to me, remember? With state secrets as a gift."

Back when it had all been a brilliant game. Reckless and dangerous, deadly for bystanders, but not meant to be deadly between them.

Except that it had been, and Sherlock had realised too late. Moriarty's endgame had always been death.

Too late for any number of things, now.

Sherlock's eyes flicker towards the door. He could leave, break this cosy little tête-à-tête. Shut the door firmly on the memories, focus on the now.

He could. He's done it before; he knows he could.

But - a breath shudders out of him, admission and resignation - just because he _could_ doesn't mean it's an option. He's not a child this time; he can't bring himself to choose self-deception.

On Moriarty's face, a smile grows, and grows. He lunges forward, brought short only by the chain holding him - and then the chain is falling to the floor, and Moriarty's hands are free. Sherlock draws in a hissing breath as Moriarty strides forward, his hair slicking back, his stained straitjacket turning into an impeccable charcoal suit.

Sherlock doesn't retreat. Can't - his back is already to the padded wall. Moriarty leans in, nonchalantly bracing his arms to the side of Sherlock's face. Pressing a palm against the padding, testing its give. "Say, this is comfortable. Good idea, Sherlock."

Moriarty's mouth tastes of gunpowder and blood, and if he were in his right mind - and if his mouth weren't occupied - Sherlock would be complaining about just how nonsensical that is.

Of course, if he were in his right mind, he wouldn't be kissing Moriarty.

(Would he? How could he? It's a non-question. It has to be.)

Belatedly, Sherlock jerks away. Moriarty pulls back, mouth wet with saliva, just far enough that Sherlock can see his face. Sherlock swallows heavily. 

"Why did I want you?" It comes out more hoarsely than he'd like.

A nonchalant shrug, felt against his body - Moriarty is pressed right up against him, their thighs slotting together. "Does it matter? I'm dead."

That, in fact, is part of the problem. "Why do I still want you?"

"Did you hear me? Dead here." Dark eyes, widened with exaggerated expressiveness, meet Sherlock's. "Requiesco in pace."

"Yes," Sherlock snaps, petty and knowing it, "that's why I didn't hear you." It's poor defence against firm, warm muscle pressed against him, useless against the awareness of his own skin, his chest, his limbs. 

And, of course, what's between his thighs.

It's not dull. Not tedious at all. Sweat is gathering on Sherlock's brow.

"Oh, clever. Really, that's clever. Very nice," Moriarty mocks, slipping a hand between them, cupping Sherlock's cock through his trousers. "Is it fun, trading barbs with yourself? I wouldn't know; I never tried. Well, with you, but that's only _almost_ the same thing."

Moriarty's thumb strokes over his trouser seam. Sherlock's cock jumps. But when he tries to push Moriarty off him, his arms can't pull free from the wall. The padding has swallowed them, holding them in place.

Panic rises. Adrenaline rushes through his body. Adrenaline, yes, that's the defensible chemical; he doesn't need to consider the others.

Moriarty's hand is inside his trousers now, wrapping right around his cock. Sherlock's hips jerk forward, entirely against his will -

  


* * *

  


\- and Sherlock is stretched out on the sofa, in the same place he was when he went into his mind palace, in the same position, except that his cock is painfully hard, straining against his trousers, and in his mouth, there's still the taste of gunpowder and blood.

Sherlock gasps for breath. Wipes his mouth. Downs half a mug of tea long gone cold. Glares down at his treacherous body. 

Was that progress - can this be called progress if once again, Moriarty has caught him on the wrong foot? Even dead, the man's still getting the better of him.

And the worst part is that it doesn't even gall him, not as much as it should. It makes him angry, yes - but angry that Moriarty is dead, angry that he can't ever even the score between them, that he can't ...

Just angry. That's all. And it's in anger that he unbuttons his fly, pulls out his cock. It's in anger that he jerks himself off, furious and rough, not imagining Moriarty's hands on him at all.

  


* * *

  


Sherlock doesn't go back into his mind palace. Doesn't stay in his flat, either - takes a romp through London, times some new shortcut routes left open by recent construction, and solves a burglary in passing, by reading a newspaper someone left on a bench.

He doesn't consciously plan it, but he's not surprised when he finds himself on the roof at Barts, scowling at an empty spot where a corpse once lay.

"Why would I want you?" he sneers. "All you ever wanted was death."

Not true, of course. What Moriarty _wanted_ was not to be bored. With that not in the cards, death had been the next best option. 

_In the end, it was easy_ , Moriarty had said. Everything was easy, nothing a challenge, not even Sherlock, and so, with nothing to look forward to, Moriarty had plotted his last game, his last victory.

That horrible gladness in his eyes, when Sherlock had convinced him he was a match for Moriarty after all ...

Sherlock squeezes his eyes shut. That's the problem, right there: it's never been a question the other way round. Moriarty was always a challenge to _him_.

Even dead, he still is.

Shivering, grimacing, Sherlock forces himself to confront the question again: _Why do I want you?_

Forces himself to confront the answer.

"Easy," he mutters. "Obvious." 

Obvious indeed: with Moriarty, Sherlock was never in control. Moriarty's mind, so much like his - the same boredom that came from seeing too much, the same craving for stimulation - was always one step ahead of him. Moriarty is everything he can't predict, can't control. _The fly in the ointment, the crack in the lens, the virus in the data._ And that's terrifying and exciting in the worst and best ways, all together.

Even Sherlock's revulsion at Moriarty's crimes was lost in that thrill. 

Arousal, attraction, sex - none of that had ever held much appeal to Sherlock. But before Moriarty, they'd never come with _this_ \- the danger, the brilliance, the loss of control.

It's all over now, and Sherlock is grateful - glad that no one else can get caught in the crossfire of Moriarty's struggle with Sherlock, and with himself.

But yes, damn it all, Sherlock does miss it. Does miss _him_.

  


* * *

  


Sherlock sits down, leans his back against a heat exchanger unit, lets his mind palace rise around him like the gloss of sunrise over the rooftop. Only one thing left to do.

The scene turns to paper, lifelike prints in billboard-size hanging around him. He's standing in the middle of that artificial scene, and Moriarty is smirking at him.

"Figured it out, then?"

Sherlock only nods. His heart is hammering, and he can't tell if it's fear, if it's excitement, if it's arousal. Then again, does he need to tell them apart? It can be all of them. 

_I don't have to fear it._ Exactly as Moriarty kept saying.

Moriarty examines him for a long moment, then abruptly turns, tears down one of the paper hangings. Behind it, water is falling, incessantly, with a roar. Then all the paper scenery is drenched, and crumpling, and gone - it's wet and raining, and they're on a ledge, a waterfall thundering around them.

Sherlock has his hands on Moriarty's neck. In this moment, he should squeeze, shake, push. Fight. But that's not why he's here this time. 

Instead, his fingers relax against Moriarty's skin.

Moriarty grins up at him. "There you are. Finally catching on! Took you long enough." And he leans forward, brushes his lips against Sherlock's.

It's not forceful, this time. It doesn't taste of blood. It's not like any other kiss Sherlock has experienced, either, the physical touch of lips/tongue/teeth/saliva somehow altered by ... by ...

Sherlock pulls away, scoffs. "It would never have been like this. Not between us."

Moriarty scrunches up his nose. There's a tiny, too-knowing smile curving the corner of his mouth. "You'll never know now, will you?" But he pulls away, steps up to the edge of the ledge they've been fighting (kissing) on. There's no one else here this time, no one to protect Sherlock from the truths of his own mind.

Moriarty sways a little, staring into the deep. "Do you know what they say about the lure of the abyss?"

Sherlock scoffs. "You already went over the falls once."

"So did you." 

True: not when Moriarty had asked him to, but in the end, Sherlock had jumped - freely, willingly, going deeper in order to wake up.

Not deep enough, he knows now.

"Eros and Thanatos, what a cliché," murmurs Moriarty, echoing - as ever - Sherlock's thoughts.

Terrifying, and erotic because it's terrifying: there's no thrill, no attraction, if he can't lose. But losing means consequences Sherlock isn't willing to take. Risks for other people he can't accept.

How could he have let himself want, given the risk - given the cost?

 _You wanted anyway, you just claimed you didn't,_ a voice very like Moriarty's whispers at the back of his mind. And this time, for once, Sherlock doesn't pretend not to hear it.

After all, Moriarty is dead. The only one at risk is Sherlock himself - the only risk is in denying the truth to himself.

Only one way to move forward, now. Literally. Sherlock's eyes sweep the depths of the roaring abyss.

"Cliché or not." Sherlock takes a deep breath, holds out a hand, echoes Moriarty's words: "Shall we go over together?"

Moriarty's dark eyes burn through him. Sherlock lets him look, confident - for once with nothing to prove. Not any more.

Then Moriarty blinks, and his eyes are wet - it's not just rain on his face, despite his smile. It's the look from the rooftop, a moment away from a gunshot, grateful and happy.

Sherlock's throat closes up. It's that same terrifying gladness in Moriarty's eyes now, and this time, Sherlock knows what he's seeing. This time, Sherlock understands.

"Thank you, Sherlock Holmes," Moriarty whispers. And takes his hand.

It's not a good-bye. Moriarty is long gone, and what's there Sherlock's mind palace will no doubt remain. So this is not an ending; it can't be. It is simply truth, acknowledged, long overdue.

A moment later they're falling, hands still gripping, into the rush of water, of death.

  


* * *

  


Until Sherlock wakes, alone. 


End file.
